Main menu

Main menu

Handing out MLB Weekly Awards

All stats are for the period of Monday, May 17 through Sunday, May 23. All season stats are through the 23rd. For award definitions, see this year’s primer.

This week’s proof that assigning wins and losses to a pitcher is an arcane practice that must stop

Good luck division

Cliff Leegot bombed, giving up eight runs in six and a third to the Padres. Wade LeBlanc’s start was worse though, letting eight Seattle baserunners to score. Cesar Ramos compounded the San Diego misery by giving up seven more runs in one inning of work, pushing his ERA to 21.21. Lee got one of the ugliest wins you will ever see.

Popular Video

A police officer saw a young black couple drive by and pulled them over. What he did next left them stunned:

Popular Video

A police officer saw a young black couple drive by and pulled them over. What he did next left them stunned:

Jered Weaver and C.J. Wilson yielded 14 runs in nine frames. Their combined strikeout total outpaced their total home runs allowed by only one. They hardly can blame it on it just being a great day for bats as eight relievers threw eight innings and gave up only one run on five hits. Both starters simply stunk and both escaped statistical blame for their poor performance.

Matt Cain moved to 2-4 despite a 2.88 ERA when he was tagged with the loss across the bay. Cain allowed seven base runners and only one extra base hit. The only run scored in the entire game came in an inning in which Oakland didn’t get a hit. Adam Rosales was hit by a pitch. Then he advanced on an error by Aubrey Huff. Then he advanced to third on a sacrifice. Then he scored on a Coco Crisp sacrifice fly.

Zack Greinke gave up two solo home runs to Luke Scott, but left in line for the victory having given his team seven innings. The very next half inning, Blake Wood, who has been pitching pretty well since being called up, gave up a solo home run of his own, this one to Corey Patterson, handing Greinke another no-decision. Greinke struck out six and walked only one.

Marco Estrada threw four innings of one-run relief for starter Manny Parra, who had the same number of innings pitched and runs. Estrada was in line for the victory, well earned as far as I am concerned, but the continuing meltdown of the great Trevor Hoffman claimed Estrada’s victory as a victim.

In his first major league start, Hisanori Takahashi gave the Mets six innings of shutout baseball, striking out six men from the Bronx. No decision.

Brian Wilson demonstrated exactly how badly you can perform in a game where you inherit a three-run lead and still get credit for the save. Not only did he allow Chris Denorfia and Yorvit Torrealba to reach base, but he allowed David Eckstein to smack a double, driving them in. He eventually pieced together enough outs to escape the jam he got himself into.

Matt Albers entered in the sixth inning and allowed an inherited run to score on an RBI ground out after walking Josh Willingham before he escaped the inning. Then in the seventh, he allowed a double, a home run and a walk before being replaced by Will Ohman, who got him out of the inning, stranding a runner left behind by Albers. Albers was credited with a hold for that bit of work.

Any sufficiently advanced defense is indistinguishable from pitching

Tim Wakefield has been known to do this from time to time. When the knuckler is dancing the right way, he sometimes will goad the opposing hitters into hitting a lot of weak grounders and pop-ups. In this case, he tossed eight shutout innings while striking out one Phillies hitter (Ryan Howard if you were curious).

It almost seems as if the best pitchers in baseball all got together and decided that they would remind everybody how hard it is to be excellent all the time. Within a four-day span, both reigning Cy Young winners got torched. I mentioned Lincecum’s atrocity in the good luck section. Greinke followed suit on Sunday by getting lit up for eight runs by the Rockies. The Royals being the Royals, Greinke did not escape with a no-decision.

Wigginton hit .194/.242/.290. Wright was a very flat .167/.160/.250. Kubel drew five walks, but collected only four total bases for a .167/.313/.167 line. Young was the best of the bunch with a .240/.276/.400 week.

Zobrist? He put on a clinic, not just hitting .500/.571/.786 with six walks and a pair of doubles and home runs, but also stealing three bases in four attempts.

Sanchez Award

I hesitate to bring up Yuniesky Betancourt because .310/.310/.414 is actually the upper range of what you can reasonably expect from him and it isn’t his fault that the Royals keep putting him out there to look ridiculous in the field and impotent at the plate.

Back when I wrote about prospects on my own blog, Michael Bourn was one of the players I was most irrationally exuberant about.* After his 2004 season in which he posted a .431 OBP in his first full season assignment and stole 58 bases in 64 attempts, I was buying what he was selling. He still hasn’t had a bad career, but you would have thought he was Tim Raines from listening to me.

Dan Uggla found a way to single only once all week. Fortunately for Marlins fans, he doubled twice, homered three times, and walked six times for a gaudy .240/.375/.680 line.

Chris Snyder collected only 14 at-bats this week. In those at-bats, he got a hit only three times. Fortunately, two of those went for extra bases and he chipped in five walks to bring his line up to .214/.421/.500.

Finally, Felipe Lopez went .240/.345/.560 thanks to a triple, two homers and four bases on balls.

Austin Kearns has been a nice story this year, coming back from the dead to hit .304/.377/.487 for Cleveland. But striking out nine times in 22 plate appearances is a prescription for a .190/.261/.286 week.

Three true outcomes

Uggla got the Killebrew this week in large part because he racked up the TTO events. He homered three times, walked six times and struck out 12 times in 31 plate appearances.

Neither Edwin Encarnacion nor Kevin Youkilis struck out very often, but they each hit for power and walked. Encarnacion went six-two-two in 21 PA, punctuated by three solo shots in a loss to the Diamondbacks. Youkilis went four-five-three in 27 PA.

With the death of Jose Lima, the world is a less entertaining place. When it comes to pitching, sometimes he was very good and sometimes he was very bad. But not once is his life, and especially in his baseball career, was he ever boring or predictable. It is too bad he never had a chance to write a book about his life and his career. I guarantee that would have been a fascinating read. Here’s hoping that wherever he is today has a great meringue band and his fastball and change-up are working.

This week’s MVP

AL: Justin Morneau was a hitting machine with six singles, five doubles, two home runs and six walks for a .481/.576/.889 line.

NL: It was a good week for first basemen. My runner-up for the AL was Youkilis and my MVP for the NL is Adrian Gonzalez, who went .444/.559/.778. Second place was Phoenix first baseman Adam LaRoche.

John Barten writes the THT Awards weekly feature. Please send suggestions, comments, corrections, and input to his email address. Follow him on Twitter at JohnMBarten